Heartless Con-Dems dump 137 disabled Scots on the dole as they announce closure of last five Remploy factories

Workers at the Remploy factory in Leven have now lost their jobs (Image: George McLuskie)

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THE Con-Dem’s yesterday condemned 137 disabled Scots to the dole queue when they announced the closure of the five remaining Remploy factories.

The decision left factory workers distraught and was branded “shameful” by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

The businesses affected are the Marine and Frontline Textile factories at Leven, Cowdenbeath, Stirling, Dundee and Clydebank.

The Government also said no bids had been made for factories in Norwich, Portsmouth, Burnley and Sunderland.

More than 230 disabled people across the UK face redundancy. The DWP said 137 staff at the Scots plants would lose their jobs.

Brown said: “This is a shameful abandonment of disabled people who work at Remploy.

“The factories at Leven and Cowdenbeath have a full order book and could easily expand their workload given the demand for their product.

“I understand there was at least one bid to take over the facilities and I want to know what happened to that bid.

“The work, producing 30,000 high tech lifejackets a year, will continue but will now be moved elsewhere, possibly outside the UK.

“Once again, men and women who have given their lives to building up a business and have proved they have a continuing long-term market for their products have been deserted in their hour of need. They have been abandoned by the government.”

In a Commons statement, Work and Pensions Minister Esther McVey said three businesses across nine sites would close.

Scottish Enterprise Minister Fergus Ewing said: “Throughout the last year I have urged UK ministers to think again and to consider the impact on the employees, many of whom have worked in Remploy all their adult lives.”

Ewing said there was a potential buyer for the Scottish factories and the Scottish government would seek to work closely with Remploy to help preserve as many jobs as possible.

Anne McGuire, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Disabled People, claimed the UK Government’s record on disability was “nothing short of a disgrace”.

She added: “The vast majority of the disabled workers this government has already sacked from Remploy are still out of work, and disability unemployment is still higher than in May 2010.”